Page:Weird Tales Volume 3 Number 4 (1923-04).djvu/85

tween her and the sheriff. Two husky jail attendants heaved the ladder from beneath her, and Mary Blandy's slender body swung between earth and heaven.

It was half an hour before they cut her down, for her weight was not great enough to break her neck, and she strangled slowly, while the great crowd of mean folk, gathered to watch the execution, stood in hang-jawed amazement to see a woman fight so long for life.

At one o'clock the following morning she was carried by torchlight to the family vault at Henley, and, with the rope that strangled her still about her slim, white throat, buried beside the father for whose murder, rightly or wrongly, she was hanged.

Diligent search was made for Captain Cranstoun, but the scoundrel had heard of Mary's arrest, and, deserting the army, fled to France. For five years he lived a fugitive from justice, but the government took legal proceedings to attach the source of his income. At last, reduced to abject poverty, he died in a home for the indigent kept by the church at Boulogne, and was buried in a nameless grave in foreign soil. ((rule|5em}} This is the Fifth Article of a Series That Seabury Quinn is Writing for Weird Tales. The Sixth Will Appear in Our Next Issue. It is Entitled "The Werewolf of St. Bonnot," and Describes Some Startling Things that Happened in France Under the Reign of Charles IX. Be Sure to Read this Gripping Article in the May Weird Tales.

nothing but the truth: I was born in this very city of Loom, in this very Palace of Conderogan, and that was twenty-five years ago, and so I am but twenty-five years of age! How could I be any older? Now—"

"But—"I struck in.

"Oh, you big goose," she laughed, "stop butting and do some thinking!"

"What's the use?" I wailed. "What's the use of even trying to think?"

"My Farnermain," she said seriously, "can you not see how what I have uttered can be divested of its seeming absurdity? For I assure you it is no more than that."

I shook my head.

"Won't you explain, O Draconda?"

"In due season," she smiled. "I must go now. And I pray you to ponder on the absurdities that I have uttered, to seek the key that will unlock the mystery. I tell you, the human mind is one of the blindest of all things created, what with its prison walls of the flesh.

"You, my Farnermain, put all your faith in those beliefs and thought processes that the wise ones have declared infallible, and thus you do not see (who should long ago have seen) and think that the darkness which is in your own brain is gibberish uttered by me.

"Your mind, my Farnermain, is like an eagle with its wings weighted down—though it is not your fault at all. But strive to cast off those weights, my Farnermain, which are but the blunders of divers flesh-entombed souls, and thus let your mind soar up to the wonder heights, even as the free-pinioned eagle soars."

But I shook my head, feeling certain that it would be futile to try to discover in her gibberish anything save gibberish.

"Well, I must go now," she said, smiling at my mystification.

Then, with the princess, she quitted the room, saying with a little laugh as she vanished:

"Think hard, O Farnermain."

For a little space, I stared at the curtains through which this extraordinary creature had vanished, then began to walk back and forth, my feet falling noiselessly on the rich carpet.

Think! I did think, but I could not make out anything rational.

She was born on Venus, had passed all her life on Venus, and yet she had known Morgan St. Cloud on the earth! She had seen one hundred and twenty-five years, and yet she was but twenty-five years of age!

That, to use a phrase of Natty Bumppo's, certainly was a "nonplusser."

"Draconda" Will be Concluded in the Next Issue of Weird Tales. It Rises to an Astounding Climax. Be Sure to Read the End of this Story!

"I would like to have my case postponed for a week, your honor, as my lawyer is ill."

"But you were caught with your hand in this gentleman's pocket. What could your counsel say in your defense?"

"That's what I'm curious to know, your honor."

Two women went for a walk and presently climbed to a cemetery which overlooks one of the most beautiful valleys in Yorkshire.

"I think," said one of them to her friend, after they had admired the view, "that I should like to be buried here. It's such a healthy spot."

from the general store. It contained but one cartridge.

Stollard got the bacon and returned to the fire he had started without looking directly at the Cockney. His back again was turned. Slowly Cravens rose and took deliberate aim.

Simultaneously with the report Stollard's body fell, dying, into the fire, extinguishing it and scattering embers. A thin stream of blood flowed from the wound in his temple.

Cravens paused to make certain he was dead. Then he walked to the body and turned it over on its back. It was the work of a few seconds to remove the sack of money from the lifeless man's pocket.

"Bryke me ribs, will ye?" snarled Cravens into the lifeless face. "Not with this ye won't," looking fondly at the pistol. Then he gave the weapon a far fling into the bushes.

"Bryke me ribs, will ye?" he repeated, as he prepared to leave the ravine which Stollard had selected for a camping place because it was evidently so far from the beaten paths of man.

"Bryke me ribs, will ye?" again repeated this man, who never had heard of Shakespeare. "I'll have ye know that for me the bryking of ribs is a sport for ladies." And, with a final kick to the body of his erstwhile leader, he went back to the city, where Alma Brooks and Detective Sergeant Sweeney were waiting for him.

The proprietor of a village store was sitting with the loafers who had formed a circle around the stove. His sole assistant was a youngster who had lately drifted in from parts unknown. A woman entered and asked for a pound of cheese. She would not allow the assistant to wait on her but insisted on having the proprietor. The lad must have been trained in some city office, for to this demand he made firm reply.

"Can't disturb him now. He's in conference."

A man arrested for murder bribed a simple member of the jury with a hundred dollars to insist on a verdict of manslaughter. The jury were out a long time, and at last came in with the desired verdict. Afterward the prisoner had an opportunity of seeing the simple juror, and said: "I'm obliged to you, my friend. Did you have a hard time?"

"Yes," replied the man. "A deuce of a time. The other eleven wanted to acquit you."